The Case of the "Bishop with a Human Face" Dismissed by the Pope

The Chiesa
September 20, 2012

http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1350329?eng=y

[Vatican Diary / The "who's who" of the deposed bishops]


At the end of last spring, an article from www.chiesa focused on the many cases of bishops asked to resign by the Vatican because they were seen as no longer capable of fulfilling their office, or, in the case of refusal to resign, "relieved" of their posts personally by the pope:

> Vatican Diary / The "who's who" of the deposed bishops

A few days after the publication of this article, another case of this kind emerged in Slovakia.

The news is in a terse statement from the Vatican dated July 2:

"Il papa ha sollevato dalla cura pastorale dell’arcidiocesi di Trnava (Slovacchia) S.E. Mons. Robert Bezak, C.SS.R.".

The deposed archbishop, 52 years old, a Redemptorist, has left his post and has also been obliged to reside outside of the archdiocese. But his case appears to be far from closed. It is invading the Slovakian media and dividing public opinion, Catholic and not. Leading intellectuals and artists have closed ranks in defense of this "bishop with a human face," according to them unjustly driven out for having wanted to expose the malfeasance of his predecessor Jan Sokol, who retired in 2009 after reaching the age limit.

In effect, Archbishop Sokol, in addition to being suspected – like many others – of collaborating with the secret service of the previous communist regime, had been hit by a crescendo of accusations concerning the administration of the assets of the archdiocese, which he had put under his name and which only he could control.

These were significant sums, of several million euro, coming from the restitution to the Church of property that had previously been confiscated by the communist regime, from donations from wealthy Slovaks residing in the United States or other countries, and from returns on financial investments abroad.

The attorney general of the Slovakian state has opened a case for fiscal fraud. And as soon as he was appointed archbishop, Bezak himself lashed out noisily against his predecessor's management, coming to the point of testifying against him in 2010 in a lawsuit between Sokol and the magazine "Tyzden," which had published confidential information about the administration of the archdiocese.

Bezak informed the nunciature in Slovakia and the Vatican secretariat of state about what he believed to be Sokol's malfeasance. And he also requested an apostolic visitation of the archdiocese.

But he obtained the opposite of what he was expecting.

The nuncio in Bratislava, Mario Giordana, conducted the investigation of the case. But he concluded that Archbishop Sokol had not personally appropriated anything. If anything, he had acted as many other archbishops of the former Soviet empire, who, not trusting the new leadership classes and fearing new confiscations and harassment, put under their own names the assets of the diocese and donations from abroad, in accounts "protected" as much as possible, like those of the Institute for Works of Religion, the Vatican bank. In any case, today the Vatican authorities no longer see such behavior as justifiable, in a political context that has been stabilized.

As for the apostolic visitation, this took place during the latter half of January of 2012. But instead of being against Sokol, it backfired against Bezak himself. For administrative infractions, this time his own, but also doctrinal and disciplinary violations.

The apostolic visitation had been ordered from Rome by the congregation for the clergy headed by Cardinal Mauro Piacenza.

The inspector selected was the bishop of Litomerice in the neighboring Czech Republic, Jan Baxant.

In one week, Baxant interviewed all of the bishops of Slovakia, and many other religious and lay witnesses.

According to the final report of the visitation, Bezak, after firing all of the administrative personnel of the archdiocese in office with his predecessor, had entrusted the substantial diocesan portfolio to two commercial companies, Ninett and Hanalex, created and directed by two administrator friends of his, Ondrej Studenec and Anna Hust'avova, already responsible for the slipshod management of the assets of the neighboring diocese of Banska Bystrica, where Bezak was a pastor before being promoted as archbishop of Trnava.

The fact is that in a few months of management, before the relationship with Ninett and Hanalex was broken off, these two companies accumulated a debt with the archdiocese of almost 600,000 euro, for loans not repaid and revenue not deposited. A debt that the Vatican authorities view as "unrecoverable."

But no less grave are the doctrinal and disciplinary failures that the Vatican authorities have detected in Archbishop Bezak.

After breaking off relations with his own auxiliary bishop and alienating all of the pastoral management directors inherited from Sokol – vicar general, chancellor, judicial vicar, treasurer, dean – Archbishop Bezak is believed to have entrusted "positions of responsibility to unworthy priests, some of them from other dioceses, in that they are living in situations of open immorality and violation of discipline." Read: homosexuality and concubinage.

Not only that. Bezak is thought to have distinguished himself – still according to the Vatican authorities – "in blatant lack of observance of liturgical norms, in the support given to ideas contrary to Catholic doctrine consistently taught by the sacred magisterium with regard to the indissolubility of marriage, euthanasia, and the sacrament of Holy Orders, showing little respect for the Roman pontiff."

Not to mention his "public mockery of clergy in clerical dress" and "wearing inappropriate secular clothing even on official occasions like visits to parishes to impart the sacrament of Confirmation."

Bezak has repeatedly complained that he has not been informed by the Vatican authorities about the real accusations brought against him, and that he has not been able to explain his reasons to the leading authorities of the Roman curia and to the pope. And because of this, he has refused to resign.

In reality, at the end of the apostolic visitation in January, the visitor Baxant listened to him once again, presenting the accusations gathered and asking him to reply.

On May 3, Cardinal Marc Ouellet, prefect of the congregation for bishops, sent him a list of 11 questions concerning doctrine and discipline. To which Bezak responded in writing, in very argumentative terms.

Bezak has also had the opportunity to meet with the nuncio in Slovakia on a number of occasions.

Of course, the Vatican authorities have not made any of this public. Nor has the Slovakian episcopal conference, unanimously allied against the deposed archbishop.

And this gives Bezak and his supporters a way to complain of the violation of the right to defense, to maintain that the pope has been "misinformed" or even "deceived," and to turn the case of a single "relieved" bishop into a question of mismanagement of the universal Church.

Meanwhile, Benedict XVI has appointed as apostolic administrator of Trnava, pending the designation of the new archbishop, the auxiliary Jan Orosch.